Except Jeff Nelson (the umpire, that is)

Today before the game Joe Torre took the line-up cards tothe chief umpire himself. Since when does Joe take the line-up card
out himself, except during the World Series? He went on to shake the
hand of every umpire. Except Jeff Nelson.

When I turned on the radio this afternoon, before the Yankee-Angels
game at Yankee Stadium, Suzyn Waldmann, WCBS Radio color commentator,
was telling that story.

NOTE: If the NY DAILY NEWS (or anyone else) covers this story, they should credit Suzyn Waldmann for the idea. Anthony McCarron, who was a guest of WCBS Radio booth during the "DAILY NEWS 5th" inning, said he had not noticed when Ms. Waldmann mentioned the line-up card and hand-shaking routine. They discussed yesterday’s post-game report with John Sterling, who calls play-by-play during the game. He said he had been struck by how intensely Mr. Torre repeated the sequence of events that led to the game-ending call by Jeff Nelson.

I enjoyed the game at Yankee Stadium yesterday, my first of the season. We lost to the Angels, but Wang kept us in the game, and Mo closed us out beautifully, 1-2-3. Our bats q up about halfway through, and the slumping players got on base by hit or walk — Cano, Melky, Abreu. A-Rod hit a single and fielded well. Mank…witc (However you spell it — first baseman, #11) got on base and made an incredible stop. Damon pinch-hit a single in the 9th.

Early in the game I joked to Floraine Kay — who got me these 2 tickets for my birthday a long while ago — that John Sterling must be appreciating the home plate umpire, who was calling the pitches expeditiously. (Mr. Sterling can be eloquent and very funny filling time while waiting for the more deliberate umpires to signal "strike" or "ball.") We didn’t know his name at the time, but that home plate umpire was Jeff Nelson.

Throughout the game, we noticed a number of questionable calls which could have affected the score of the game. Having forgotten to bring my radio, we were cut off from what was apparently a lively discussion, particularly at the end of the game.

3 comments

I’d like to know what Torre said. I’d also like to know why he didn’t go straight to Bruney,then Proctor today. I’d also like to know what ANYONE in the Yankees organization is THINKING right now.
It was a good game Saturday, but the call was, as we both saw, brutal.

To me, it’s always a good idea to always carry two sacks of something when you walk around. That way, if anybody says, ‘Hey, can you give me a hand?,’ you can say, ‘Sorry, got these sacks.'”http://www.nicetick.com
– Air Jordan